Fresh off leading OSU to its 12th national championship last month, both Cowboys finished with 2-1-1 records at the event, which concluded on Saturday. The International side came away with a 35-25 victory over the Americans.

During Thursday’s mixed fourball action, Fang teamed with Farah O’Keefe to notch a 3-and-2 victory over Caitlyn Macnab and Daniel Bennett. Stout and Kelly Xu tied their match with Eila Galitsky and Luke Poulter.

Friday morning saw Fang and Stout paired together in a foursome match against Connor Graham and Tyler Weaver. The Cowboy duo would prevail, 3 and 1. The afternoon session saw Fang paired with O’Keefe for mixed foursomes with the duo tying its match with Weaver and Lottie Woad. 

Stout would pair with Anna Davis for the session, coming up short in a 2-and-1 loss to Carolina Chacarra and Pablo Ereno.

The event closed with singles action on Saturday with Stout taking down Charlie Forster, 3 and 2, while Fang  fell in his matchup against Justin Hastings, 2 up.

Day 1 Mixed Fourball

Farah O’Keefe/Ethan Fang def. Caitlyn Macnab/Daniel Bennett, 3&2

Preston Stout/Kelly Xu tied Eila Galitsky/Luke Poulter

Day 2 Foursomes

Ethan Fang/Preston Stout def. Connor Graham/Tyler Weaver. 3&1

Day 2 Mixed Foursomes

Ethan Fang/Farah O’Keefe tied Tyler Weaver/Lottie Woad

Carolina Chacarra/Pablo Ereno def. Preston Stout/Anna Davis, 2&1

Day 3 Singles

Preston Stout def. Charlie Forster, 3&2

Justin Hastings def. Ethan Fang, 2 up

OKLAHOMA CITY — The final game of the 2025 season was one to forget for NiJaree Canady in the Texas Tech softball team’s Game 3 loss to Texas in the championship of the Women’s College World Series.

There was no immediate reaction from Gonzaga following court approval of the landmark House vs. NCAA lawsuit settlement on Friday evening.

No statement on the Bulldogs’ website. Nothing from athletic director Chris Standiford or basketball coach Mark Few on social media. Nothing but radio silence in Spokane, where it appears victors don’t gloat.

That’s right, folks. The Zags stand to become one of the biggest winners in the post-House world, where schools can share revenue with athletes starting July 1.

And they aren’t alone. Any school that values basketball and doesn’t compete in, or care about football could create for itself a substantial advantage in the talent-acquisition process.

Allow us to explain.

The revenue-sharing component features a cap of $20.5 million in the 2025-26 competition year, with annual increases expected. The power conference schools will undoubtedly max out in order to avoid blowback in recruiting, but there’s no requirement to do so.

Each athletic department will determine how to allocate the money, but the generally-accepted breakdown in the ACC, Big 12, Big Ten and SEC will result in about $15 million devoted to football rosters, roughly $3 million to men’s basketball and the rest to Olympic sports.

Schools with rich basketball traditions (UCLA, Arizona, Kansas, Kentucky, North Carolina and Duke) could exceed the average within the Power Four and share $4 million-to-$5 million with their basketball players, giving them an edge relative to intra-conference peers that prioritize football.

But schools without football don’t have to feed the beast. Gonzaga could plow as much as it wants into men’s basketball ($5 million, $7 million, whatever) as long as it doesn’t exceed the cap and makes the requisite commitment to Olympic sports.

It’s no different for the Big East. Whatever cash they muster can be earmarked for basketball. (Connecticut plays football but likely will prioritize basketball to the greatest extent possible.)

What’s more, the Zags can make use of third-party resources to supplement their revenue sharing.

The House settlement does not prohibit NIL. Instead, it attempts to eliminate pay-for-play funded by booster collectives and introduce a legitimate mechanism for compensating athletes for legitimate business opportunities.

The ACC, Big Ten, Big 12, SEC and Pac-12 — the five named defendants in the House lawsuit — have created an independent entity to track revenue sharing and enforce NIL payments. It’s called the College Sports Commission and will be led by Bryan Seeley, a former chief investigator for Major League Baseball and assistant U.S. attorney.

Athletes are required to report their contracts to ensure authenticity. If the deal is rejected, athletes can adjust the terms and resubmit or seek arbitration. Schools that allow athletes to compete with rejected deals could be subject to penalties assessed by the CSC.

Put another way: The more legitimate business opportunities available for athletes, the better.

Schools located in communities that are passionate about basketball will, in theory, have more avenues to compensate athletes with real NIL than schools in communities obsessed with football.

Combine the business opportunities in Spokane with the athletic department’s ability to disproportionately compensate its basketball team — as compared to the football-playing schools — and the Zags are extraordinarily well-positioned for the next era.

In the post-House world, it pays to not pay the football beast.

Other winners and losers from the lawsuit settlement …

Loser: The fans. Anything that increases expenses for athletic departments results in a greater burden placed on fans. Not only will direct donations be needed like never before, but constituents in the local business communities will be under pressure to provide NIL opportunities, as well.

Winner: Ed O’Bannon. The former UCLA basketball star started this decade-long economic transformation when he took the NCAA and EA Sports to court over the use of his likeness and image in a video game. His successful lawsuit led to NIL, which led to revenue sharing.

Loser: Administrative bloat. The budgetary pressures caused by $20.5 million in player compensation will cause schools to redirect all available cash. That could lead to staff downsizing and the elimination of mid-level managerial positions so pervasive in major college athletics. Expect to see fewer deputy senior assistant athletic directors for changing the water cooler.

Winner: Power Four bifurcation. It might take several years to determine the full implications of revenue sharing, but this much is immediately obvious: Schools with the deepest pockets and greatest commitment to winning will have an advantage. And those factors are absolutely not distributed equally throughout the power conferences. By the turn of the decade, it could be clear which schools covet the creation of a super league and which schools will be content downsizing their football programs.

The more fans who play as a specific college football team, the more revenue the school will receive.

PublishedJune 7, 2025 3:08 PM EDT•UpdatedJune 7, 2025 3:09 PM EDT

• Facebook
• Twitter
• Email
• Copy Link

In an eye-opening and major development in the ongoing world of NCAA and NIL deals, EA Sports has announced that schools will now be able to get paid based on the number of times gamers choose their team in the upcoming EA Sports College Football 26 video game.

According to Cllct’s Matt Liberman, schools will be compensated in the form of royalties by how often their team is “used in gameplay.” There are 136 colleges and universities that have opted into the partnership with the gaming company, with all now eligible to be part of the revenue royalty program.

“For each CFB product released by EA SPORTS, we (CLC Learfield) will provide a percentage for each institution based on the games played for that institution as a percentage of the total games played across all institutions. This percentage of games played will become the final allocation percentage for each school that will be applied to the total gross royalties for all institutions received,” Cllct media reports based on documents obtained via the Freedom of Information Act. 

SIGN UP for The Daily OutKick. New Look, Same Attitude.

FANS CAN HELP MONETIZE THEIR FAVORITE TEAM

In other words, video gamers and fans will be able to have a direct impact on their school’s recruiting and NIL money. The possibilities are endless in what may turn out to be a brilliant strategic move by EA Sports. The gaming company clearly knows that college football has some of the most rabid fanbases in all sports – from the Vols to Bama to the Bulldogs and the Clemson Tigers. The possibilities for chaos (and a heck of a lot of video game sales) are massive.

“It’s a fascinating incentivizer from EA Sports standpoint,” one high-level gaming source told me while adding that he expects more games to be sold and more teams and schools to be committed to building their EA relationships and marketing efforts. 

THERE ARE SOME CONCERNS THOUGH

As with all things related to NIL these days, there are some important questions that need be answered. The first one involves the compensatory system itself. The public needs to know what, or more importantly, how long a game must be played in order to count towards the school’s NIL program.

My bigger concern, however, is bots. 

Who is to stop bots and automatic gaming systems from just racking up games throughout the night from all over the globe? There has to be some sort of technological oversight, otherwise, the legitimacy of the royalty program would come into question, similar to what happened with Spotify after it was found that some third parties were being hired by labels, or artists, in order to utilize automated streaming systems to boost a particular song or album. The result not only brought in more compensation and royalties, but also attention and more popular playlist adds. Both the NCAA and EA Sports need to make sure this doesn’t happen.

“There are ways to monitor for that sort of thing and also the community itself can help police that with reports and what not,” the gaming source continued. “Although we still don’t know what counts as ‘games played’, my guess would be online games only, which would be easier to track for bots and other nefarious activity.”

Regardless, the EA Sports / NIL / NCAA development is another gamechanger as schools will look to bring in as much additional revenue as they can. On Friday, a judge upheld the House Settlement ruling that essentially allows schools to pay college athletes, which is expected to change the landscape of college sports forever.

Between that ruling and EA Sports’ latest royalty program, everything we once knew about college sports continues to be dismantled. 

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THE CURRENT COLLEGE FOOTBALL NIL LANDSCAPE? TWEET ME: @TheGunzShow